


You Are Not Alone

by fandomstakeoveryourlife



Series: Alien Invasion or Teen Angst? [3]
Category: Class (TV 2016)
Genre: Anxious Matteusz, Depressed Matteusz, M/M, Teen Angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-24
Updated: 2018-02-24
Packaged: 2019-03-11 06:04:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,985
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13518093
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fandomstakeoveryourlife/pseuds/fandomstakeoveryourlife
Summary: Matteusz couldn't avoid school forever, but facing the three friends of his boyfriend was the last thing he wanted to do right now.





	You Are Not Alone

Matteusz slung his bag over his left shoulder and hurried downstairs to the front hallway where he knew Charlie was waiting for him. Today was the day he was going back to school. So far, he'd missed 5 days and Charlie had helped him to catch up with everything. But now, he'd decided he couldn't hide until the awful sadness, that had hung over him for a few weeks now, had passed. For all he knew, that could take forever.

Charlie smiled widely when Matteusz appeared in the narrow hallway. "Ready to go?" 

Matteusz sighed and shrugged. "I suppose so." 

Together, they left the house and locked it up behind them. It felt weird to be walking to school along a route he'd never taken before. Matteusz had an earphone tucked into his left ear, playing music a little too loudly. Recently, music has really, really helped with pretty much everything. It distracted him when he needed it and helped him to concentrate (somehow) when he needed that. Quill had thoughtfully forged him a permission note so he could listen to music in class. Hopefully no one would look too far into it.

The sprawling school building appeared far too quickly for Matteusz's liking. He just wanted to keep walking forever and never reach the school he had to go back to. Though he knew he couldn't avoid it forever.

Charlie glanced sideways at his boyfriend and sent him a quick, encouraging smile. "It will be fine. Nothing to worry about." Matteusz smiled unsurely back and let himself be led inside by his partner.

They stopped as they came up to one of the many staircases around the school building. Ram, April and Tanya were all already there. Ram was sat on one of the railing sides to the stairs, knocking a football between his feet, flicking it effortlessly into the air. April was sat on the stairs themselves, scrolling through her phone with one earbud in. Tanya was sat cross legged on the landing of the stairs, an earbud in her right ear and a fat text book open in front of her. She had her head resting in her hands and her elbows resting on her knees. She seemed completely lost in her studying.

"Hello!" Charlie greeted them brightly with his usual pleasant manner. Sometimes, Matteusz wondered how Charlie could stay so upbeat and cheerful so much of the time. 

April's head snapped up and she smiled widely when she saw Charlie standing there. Her smiled grew impossibly wider as she spotted Matteusz standing slightly behind his boyfriend, half hidden, despite being a head and a half taller than him. 

"Matteusz! It's so nice to see you back!" She exclaimed. Matteusz smiled shyly and ducked his head a little. He couldn't remember her being this kind to him before, but then again, he had been pretty rude to them. And he had been dealing with a whole lot of shit from home, so maybe he just hadn't noticed. Maybe Charlie had prewarned them he was coming back to school and asked them to be extra nice to him.

Matteusz realised April had asked him something and blinked at her, trying to remember what she'd said. But before he could make a fool of himself, Ram was jumping down from the railing beside Tanya, which made her jump and jerk her head upwards. She grinned when she saw the two boys standing together at the bottom of the stairs.

"Finally got here then. We were beginning to think you'd been attacked by aliens, or something." 

"I didn't!" April argued. Her snappish tone made Matteusz flinch a little, though he hoped no one noticed. But by the look on Ram's face, he'd seen. Matteusz turned his head away and bit his lower lip. He'd barely been back at school twenty minutes and he was already flinching like a little kid. Fuck.

"Musta been nice not being at school for a couple'a days." Ram commented to Matteusz with a half grin. Matteusz ghosted a smile and gave a half shrug in reply.

"Yeah, guess." His voice was quiet and his words were half slurred in a scarcely audible mumbled. Speaking horribly quietly and shyly was a habit he'd picked up in the few days since his parents had kicked him out of their house. Their actions had made him feel incredibly insignificant and like an annoyance. He felt like no one wanted to listen to what he had to say, so his vocal volume had dropped significantly.

All three of Charlie's friends frowned a little, but quickly recovered when Matteusz looked back up at them. An anxious feeling twisted his gut uncomfortably and made nausea rise through him in sickening waves. They other four had started up another conversation already and Matteusz felt the nausea rapidly increasing.

"'Scuse me." He mumbled, then twisted around and hurried in the direction of the boys toilets before he could get a reply. He barely made it into one of the stalls, before he was bringing the toast he'd had for breakfast up into the sickeningly shiny, porcelain bowl. His knees were trembling pathetically as he grasped the edge of the bowl tightly in his white knuckled fingers. 

Then it was over, and the nausea was dissipating and he was rising unsteadily to his feet. Matteusz flushed the loo and turned to wash his hands. He adjusted his hair with dripping fingers and glanced at the bathroom door expectantly, waiting for Charlie, and possibly Ram, to come bursting through, concern pasted on their faces, demanding to know that he was okay. 

They never came.

Matteusz wasn't sure if he was glad about this or not. Part of him was delighted to have a moment of privacy to compose himself. But, the other part was not so thrilled. It whined in his head, wanting to know why Charlie hadn't come to see if he was okay, whining that Charlie was a bad boyfriend because of this. Matteusz scolded his mind and brushed another stray hair from his lightly sweaty forehead. Charlie knew he liked his space sometimes, so that must be it, nothing bad.

The bell rang and Matteusz had to leave the bathroom to go to morning registration. 

As he entered the form room, four heads turned to look at him. Matteusz ignored all of them and flopped down into his seat. He dropped his bag onto the floor and pulled his phone and earphones out of his pocket. Plugging them in, he slid the earphone down his sleeve and popped it into his ear, carefully hiding it behind his hand. The sweet release of music flooded through his mind and he instantly relaxed.

Quill took the register in a bored tone, then let them talk amongst themselves for the last few moments. Matteusz sat in sullen silence, until a hand brushed his shoulder and he flinched violently. When he realised it was just Quill, he relaxed a little. She bent down so her mouth was by his ear.

"If you're going to listen to that silly device in class," she whispered, "at least hide it well." Then she rose up to her full height and barked at the class that it was time to leave.

Matteusz pulled his earphone out and stood with the rest of his fellow students. Together, they traipsed from the classroom and into the busy hallway, ready for their next lessons. There was a tap on his shoulder and Matteusz turned to see Charlie walking beside him.

"Hello." He greeted neutrally.

Charlie smiled widely at him, but it didn't quite reach his concern filled eyes. 

"Hello. Are you okay?" 

Matteusz studied his expression. "Are you on about my bathroom trip earlier?" He quirked an eyebrow, though the expression held no amusement.

"I-yes, I guess so." Charlie looked mildly uncomfortable and unsure.

"I threw up." Matteusz replied bluntly. He knew there was no use lying and hiding the truth.

Charlie's eyes went wide. "Are you okay? Are you ill? Do you need to go home?"

A smile of amusement flickered across Matteusz's lips. "No, am fine. Just nervous, I think." He paused. "Am sorry I was short with your friends earlier."

A frown creased Charlie's brow. "They're your friends too."

Matteusz just shrugged and said nothing. Charlie looked like he was going to say something else, but then they reached their classrooms and had to separate to go to their classes. 

By the time Lunch break swung around, Matteusz was already exhausted and ready to go home for the day. He had agreed to meet the other four outside, on the grass, under a huge weeping willow tree, because it was a 'nice day' (according to April).

Matteusz swept through the tumbling branches of leafy willow to find everyone else already there. Charlie looked up when he came through, a huge grin lightening up his entire face, making his eyes twinkle and his cheeks glow. 

"You're here!" He exclaimed in delight.

"Finally." Tanya muttered teasingly. Matteusz managed a weak smile and sat down on the grass, not exactly between the two, but near enough to them that it could be counted as such. Charlie had already burst into a conversation with Ram and partly April, throwing his hands around his wide, sweeping gestures; he was clearly very enthusiastic and overexcited about something.

Pushing his earphones in his ears, Matteusz hit play on a playlist Charlie had made for him a while back when they'd first started dating. Well, it had mostly been April, but whatever. It was supposed to be an happy, uplifting playlist, with a mixture of some Polish and some English songs on it. He'd started listening to it more recently, as an attempt to lift his mood and start to get himself out of the pit of depressing and self deprecating thoughts he seemed to have fallen into.

He pulled a book out of his bag, as well as a packet of prepacked sandwiches that Charlie demanded they picked up on the way to school so Matteusz would have something to eat at Lunch. He found his bookmarked page and opened onto it, his eyes easily picking up where he left off. His eyes flicked back and forth across the page covered in his mother tongue.

There was a poke to his left shoulder and he jumped a little. Matteusz raised his head to see Tanya looking expectantly at him. She must have asked him a question. He blinked at her. 

"What book are you reading?"

" _Kosmos_. Is Polish book."

Tanya nodded. "What's it about?"

"Is about a student who finds a hanged bird on the way to his boarding school and everything goes wrong. Is very good. Very dark."

Tanya raised her eyebrows at him. "Didn't know you were into those sorts of books." 

Matteusz nodded and twisted his head a little to look at her book. "What about you?"

"I'm reading  _1984._ It's an English Classic; you should read it sometime." 

Matteusz nodded and turned back to his own book. 

"Charlie said you didn't like us."

Matteusz' head snapped up and he stared at Tanya in alarm. 

_What?_

Tanya licked her lips. "He said you thought we didn't like you and decided you didn't like us in return."

Matteusz shook his head violently, making himself a little dizzy.

"No. I think you did not like me. Find me annoying. I know I am. Does not mean I do not like you. I not want to annoy you, so I separated myself. It is easier that way." He struggled to find the right words to explain what he was feeling and thinking.

"Pierdolić." Matteusz ran a shaking hand through his hair. Tanya was watching him with a look of concern on her face now.

"You okay?" 

"Am fine. I do not hate you." 

He turned and smiled at her, she smiled back.


End file.
